Wednesday, December 1, 2010

you smell just like christmas to me

good lord, what i would’ve done for a snow day like this when i was a kid. it snowed all last night and into this afternoon. all the schools closed, BSU cancelled classes and some businesses closed, too. some places in boise have as much as 10 inches.

it’s funny how relative snowfall is. in mccall and other heavy-snow areas, 10 inches would be nothing. people would be driving around like any other day, taking their kids to school, not having any problems. boise gets plenty of snowfall every year, but we're always so ill-equipped for dealing with it. people continue to drive like idiots (because seriously, boiseans drive like idiots, all the time. we’re famous for it.) schools close; infrastructures collapse; the very fabric of our humanity is ripped to shreds.

i knitted myself a nice warm headband, just in time for the weather. i needed something to replace a huge beanie i made to fit over my hair when it’s up--the hat’s gotten really stretched out, and people always ask me if i have dreads underneath. hate to disappoint. anyway, i like wearing this headband, it makes me feel like an 80s snowbunny...just add some shiny lycra pants, legwarmers and a puffy jacket. come to think of it i have all those things in my closet. hmm.

millie’s morbid fixation was not so unreasonable, turns out. her head exploded the same night i made her. happy death-birthday. i don’t begin to know how it went down, since she was safe and alone in the back yard. i don’t think she was acted upon by outside forces. i think she spontaneously decapitated.

the dispersal of her detached features defies the laws of physics: her eyeballs and nose were scattered around the front of her body, about a foot away, as if they jumped off her face. something took out one of her arms. one of the strings of her hat was caught on the other arm and stretched to the ground underneath chunks of her head, which were distributed exclusively on the ground behind her.

reed and i shared this exchange right after i found the body:

me: wow, millie got decapitated. i don’t know how this happened. the way her head fell apart doesn’t make any sense.

reed: oh jod, for a moment i imagined you were talking very casually about a real person being decapitated.

here’s a photo i shot in the foothills monday, when the snow wasn’t even half as deep as it is now.

andy and i took a trudge along the river this afternoon. along the way we passed kids constructing defensive walls for an impending snowball fight. someone jumped the gun and i heard, “lay off guys, the fight hasn’t started yet!!”

as a kid i was more interested in building snow forts than having snowball fights. my friends and i erected some masterpiece snow structures--even an igloo once, in andrea’s front yard. we did have a few snowball battles, though, usually when older siblings tried to claim yard territory and we were forced to defend ourselves. we always stocked a pile of pre-packed balls at the entrances to our caves, just in case we came under attack.

the best-ever snowball fight took place one day in elementary school—fifth or sixth grade, i think—when practically the whole schoolyard got into it. there were victories, casualties, and an unlimited supply of ammo, at a school with a zero tolerance policy for violence. afterward we got in so much trouble, i’d never seen the principal so pissed. he made all the classes in our grade miss a recess, brought us into the cafeteria and yelled like a madman. his face turned blood red. i had to cover my mouth to keep from busting out laughing. not sure what was more amusing, the crime or the consequences.

i took andy for a walk last night while the snow was falling. he doesn’t get a lot of nighttime walks so it was very special for him, he pranced around twice as gleefully as usual, until it was time to go home. then he was hyper and angsty all night because it wasn’t a long enough walk.

andy’s become accustomed to the very long walks i’ve been taking him on these last few months. it’s to the point where any walk under half a mile is unacceptable to him. the other day i was late meeting up with a friend but andy wouldn’t let me leave the house until we took a walk, so we went out just for a few blocks, then when i turned to go home he stood right in front of me, blocking my way, wagging and barking. when i walked forward he walked backwards, still barking, giving me this look like, “where do you think you’re going? oh hell no, keep walking.”

it was so bright out last night. like the snow was glowing. everything felt peaceful and magical and holidayish. i took a few photos of xmas lights on houses down the street.

when you look at the dome from the front it totally has a face. like it’s a monster rising out of the hill. or maybe the hill is containing the monster--buried alive by the beings it tried to massacre, held in stasis in this artificial hill for centuries, dreaming of the day it can unleash its wrath once more.

the lot is huge--20 acres surrounded by gorgeous views of the mountains. it’s located about an hour and a half west of manitou. i have to go check out this crazy dome monster sometime.